[ebisoka]

These sites are easy to figure out.

Go to Main Page

Scroll down to go to the "Code of Conduct"

Search on "Reverse"

Read

"Our community prioritises marginalised people’s safety over privileged people’s comfort. Moderators reserve the right not to act on complaints regarding:

‘Reverse’ -isms, including ‘reverse racism,’ ‘reverse sexism,’ and ‘cisphobia.’ or critiques of racist, sexist, cissexist, or otherwise oppressive behaviors or assumptions."

Ask yourself if you want to be a part of a community of people that condones certain racism and sexism.

[austin-cheney]

Sigh. There is no such thing as reverse-isms.

For example discrimination based on race is racism, objectively. Creating a reverse-ism out of that subjectively singles out a particular identity to champion. An effective code of conduct would not mention such subjectivity in any form.

[charlescearl]

Racists will always find a way to make ending racism “illegal” (they write those “laws”). Love how the US Civil Rights Acts and various emancipation clauses always contain loopholes to re-enslave folk. Like using civil rights law - mostly constructed to make life for formerly enslaved Africans plausible - now being used to erase, incarcerate, unemploy, de-legitimize, kidnap, and perform deportation of the same folks it was intended to protect. It was never “color blind” because slavery was not “color blind” (the terms always re-inscribe the borders of racism and ableism don’t they?) Never trust colonizer “law” or “logic”. Rant done.

[mock-possum]

Reverse isms are just a more specific type of an ism - instead of being wielded by a privilege group against the historically marginalized, it’s the reverse.

I do agree that it’s unkind to treat those two isms differently, or to condone one while tolerating the other - but pretending that there’s not such thing as the ‘reverse’ case seems silly, when it’s so easy to define and easy to IRL.

[austin-cheney]

Yeah, I understand the intent, but it’s still a bullshit play for identity politics. I so completely hate identity politics. Objectively speaking, the reverse of racism is no racism.

[graemep]

Ironically, its also an attitude that assumes everyone taking part is from certain groups. Most importantly, that everyone is from the west so racism is predominantly something white people do.

Their inclusivity assumes the unchallenged dominance of their own culture.

As someone who is not white and not entirely western I find it very off putting.

[grg0]

As someone who is white and entirely western, I find it very off putting.

[Fraterkes]

Here's a salient little exercise for you: if you had to "steelman" this position, this prioritising of "marginalised peoples safety" and (optional) deprioritising of moderating "reverse-isms", how would you do it? Try to make a case for this position you take such umbrage with

[concordDance]

While steelmanning is a great practice, it sometimes feels a bit unfair that many positions are not allowed to be steelmanned (socially or otherwise).

[mvolfik]

Hm, what does this say about the site in general? I understand that you disagree with the moderation guideline choices, but how does this "figure out" the whole site in your mind?

[aloisdg]

What a long way to say that you don't understand Karl Popper

[fosterbuster]

What should I understand about Karl Popper?

[rhet0rica]

Popper coined the "paradox of tolerance"—that, in order to remain tolerant, a society cannot tolerate everything; in particular, it cannot show tolerance toward those who are intolerant, as their normalization inevitably leads to the demise of toleration in the public sphere.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance

We all have to be prepared to bite our tongues in order to make the world worth living in, but it has to be a negative feedback system—those who fail to restrain themselves must (at some point) be censured for the sake of the commons. We can argue all day about how much grumbling should be permitted before we issue the rebuke, but total individual freedom invariably destroys society; it's a tragedy of the commons.

[benrutter]

Isn't the reference and context backwards here?

As in, the "you should read Popper" comment was in response to somebody saying they though opting out of moderation/censorship was not good. I think Popper would broadly agree with this, and say that moderating out racism, transphobia etc is essential for good discourse.

This is all unfounded obviously, since Popper didn't ever use or write about social media.

[rhet0rica]

Ah, an easy misunderstanding to make. The initial comment by ebisoka was not, in fact, in praise of moderation. The dog-whistle is the word "certain" near the end—insinuating that the Bonfire policy is to tolerate "racism and sexism" so long as it comes from minorities and is directed at the majority, following a quotation from the policies about how moderators may elect to ignore complaints of discrimination or inflammatory remarks when they are directed at majoritarian identities.

The CoC provides a justification for this decision—which, to elaborate on its rather simple framing, is that offensive rhetoric directed at minorities is qualitatively different from its inverse because it can incite racial violence and control the Overton window.* ebisoka doesn't consider this a worthy reason for the site's policies to admit to a biased moderation policy, but it's a deliberate nuance in the design that isn't captured in a simple description of the paradox of tolerance. (It's not an entirely problem-free policy, but the moderators aren't being instructed to ignore all abuse directed at majoritarians, just to be selective in what they tolerate. Antipathy is not quite the same as intolerance.)

Note also that ebisoka began the post with "these sites are easy to figure out," which suggests there is a multiplicity of sites like Bonfire that can be summarized (and therefore dismissed) purely on the basis of their Codes of Conduct. It's a fishing expedition for instances of affirmative action.

ebisoka put a lot of work into ensuring that post would slip by the radar for the average reader, but it's basically the same pattern of euphemisms that is guiding the Right's current crusade against DEI.

* Some strings attached. 1) Not as true in pluralistic societies or societies with near-equal splits; mostly a problem when the dominant group is vastly larger than the others. Hence other commenters remarking that this is a West-centric policy. 2) At the extreme end of the spectrum are places like South Africa and Zimbabwe, where the lingering populations of lower-class white people are subject to the double-whammy of lack of representation or advocacy in society and government, plus being the targets of resentment over colonialism.

[AlexeyBelov]

ebisoka clearly came here to sow discord and pit groups of people against each other. Their comment history is very clear on that. What's really sad is that people took the bait right away.

[chobeat]

bro, you posted cringe. This stuff was already edgy non-sense in 2016.

[ebisoka]

This is not my cringe, I'm just reposting the garbage from the Bonfire/op COC